So long, and thanks for nothing

BY KIERAN ADAIR

Mike Baird came to power by accident, following a poor choice and a $3000 bottle of wine. Let the record show this is a terrible way to pick Premiers.

While other newspapers have chosen to heap praise upon Baird’s performance in office, indulge us at City Hub while we offer this counterpoint.

Yes, for those in the business of building toll roads, owning casinos, or pimping real estate, Baird was probably the perfect Premier.

But make no mistake, for young people, public housing residents, and those crazy enough to believe their local representatives should be democratically elected, Baird was nothing short of a disaster – with consequences we’ll be dealing with for years to come.

He may have started life as ‘Teflon Mike’, but by the time he left office #CasinoMike’s list of enemies stretched from Sydney to Shoalhaven – and for good reason.

WestConnex

Although WestConnex started life under his predecessor, assisted by financing from the Federal Labor party, Baird’s influence over the project’s construction is undeniable.

Over the course of his leadership, he worked to protect it through numerous cost blowouts, damning environmental and traffic reports, and vigorous community opposition. Rather than reconsidering the project, he made it easier, passing anti-protest laws that have already been used to arrest Stop WestConnex activists.

In the coming years WestConnex will see Sydney Park, a jewel of the Inner West, lose up to 500 trees – the evidence of which can already be seen in the mangled stumps lining Euston Road. The completed road will see more cars dumped into the city, where they’ll increase congestion and air pollution for years to come.

Lockout Laws

Like WestConnex, the lockouts were another piece of baggage that Baird inherited from his predecessor. One he was only happy to carry on with. Since their introduction in 2014, the laws been blamed for crippling the cities nightlife, turning the popular haunts of Kings Cross and Oxford Street into ghost towns.

Although Baird did finally grant a minor concession on lockouts, announcing a half hour extension for some licensed venues, the damage had already been done – institutions had shuttered, and a generation had moved on.

Sydney’s nightlife will take years, if not decades, to recover from the damage wrought over the term of Baird’s time in office, but more damaging to Baird’s legacy should be the concessions granted to the casino over the same period.

The Star and Barangaroo Casinos

While the rest of Sydney suffered under the lockouts, The Star cashed in. The Baird Government  even made it easier for them, by removing the on-site inspectors that had previously worked to ensure the Casino was adhering to its licence.

Australia has the most poker machines per person of any country in the world, and New South Wales houses almost half of them. Australia also tops the list for money lost to them, about $1,144 per person per year according to The Economist.

With a net worth of $6,080 million, James Packer, Casino magnate and soon to be proprietor of the new Sydney Crown Casino ,has been a beneficiary of this predilection – so has The Star. When Mike Baird entered office, a share in The Star Entertainment Group cost $2.79, by the time he left it had almost doubled.

Public Housing

If the Sydney Crown affair demonstrated who Baird believed was deserving of a spot on Sydney’s shoreline, Millers Point showed who he wanted to keep from it. Under his leadership, Property NSW sold off almost all of the 293 public housing dwellings in Millers Point, Dawes Point and the Rocks, as well as the 79 apartments in the Sirius Building.

“The move will intensify the already severe spatial divide between rich and poor in Sydney. The social mix that is a feature of Millers Point will be obliterated along with its rich history – an irreversible tragedy.” wrote Alan Morris, of the Institute for Public Policy and Governance, last year.

Although Baird justified the move, arguing the money raised from the sell off would be used to finance new public housing stock, he failed to answer why this investment had to be contingent on selling off current properties.

Under Baird’s local government amalgamation plan, residents of Ashfield, Leichhardt and Marrickville saw their democratically elected Councillors stripped of power and replaced by unelected “General Managers.”

While the sacked Councillors were often some of the most vocal critics of WestConnex, the lockouts, and public housing sell-offs – the new GMs were noticeably more sympathetic. Thanks to the amalgamation, residents were deprived of strong community advocates at the time they most needed them.

Amalgamations didn’t affect the City of Sydney, but thanks to Baird residents of future elections will now be forced to compete with businesses in the area, each of whom get two votes, when selecting their next Council. This means that McDonalds, the Big Four Banks, and yes, Star Casino will have more of a say on who gets into Council than actual residents.